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NYU POLYTECHNIC SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING ANNOUNCES
COMMITMENT TO EXPAND COLLEGE ACCESS
AT WHITE HOUSE EVENT
BROOKLYN, New York – Today, President and Dean of the NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering Katepalli
Raju Sreenivasan will join President Obama, the First Lady, and Vice President Biden, along with hundreds of
college presidents and other higher education leaders to announce new actions to help more students prepare for
and graduate from college.
The White House College Opportunity Day of Action helps to support President Obama’s commitment to partner
with colleges and universities, business leaders, and nonprofits to support students across the country to help our
nation reach its goal of leading the world in college attainment.
As most STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics)-focused schools, increasing the student
retention at NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering is a major priority. The goal for the next 10 years is to
increase the retention rate overall by 20 percent and by 30 percent for women and other underrepresented STEM
students. NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering will use as part of its model the Higher Education Opportunity
Program, which has a 99 percent retention and success rate at NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering. NYU
Polytechnic School of Engineering is committed to providing high-quality training for 500 additional teachers
over the next 10 years—which, in turn, will have a cumulative educational footprint of 22,500 students over the
first five years.
“In order to reach the greatest number of students and equip them with skills needed to pursue a STEM education,
we need to partner with teachers and the New York Department of Education to expand and intensify our teacher
training programs,” said Dr. Sreenivasan. “The cornerstone to these improvements is student support, which
includes mentorship, tutoring, social support, and team building, besides the intellectual challenge of exciting
curriculum.”
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Since 2003, the NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering has received approximately $10.2 million in nine
National Science Foundation grants for K-12 STEM education projects. NSF is their primary federal support
source. In addition, from philanthropic sources and city and state support, the school has raised an additional
$4.2 million. Furthermore, teachers reported changes in letter grades for 3,200 participating students: 70.8 percent
saw their science, math, and overall grades improve half or one full letter grade between 2010 and 2012.
Today’s event participants were asked to commit to new action in one of four areas: building networks of colleges
around promoting completion, creating K-16 partnerships around college readiness, investing in high school
counselors as part of the First Lady’s Reach Higher initiative, and increasing the number of college graduates in
the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
The President will announce new steps on how his Administration is helping to support these actions, including
announcing $10 million to help promote college completion and a $30 million AmeriCorps program that will
improve low-income students’ access to college. Today’s event is the second College Opportunity Day of Action,
and will include a progress report on the commitments made at the first day of action on January 14, 2014.
Expanding opportunity for more students to enroll and succeed in college, especially low-income and
underrepresented students, is vital to building a strong economy and a strong middle class. Today, only 9 percent
of those born in the lowest family income quartile attain a bachelor’s degree by age 25, compared to 54 percent in
the top quartile. In an effort to expand college access, the Obama Administration has increased Pell scholarships
by $1,000 a year, created the new American Opportunity Tax Credit worth up to $10,000 over four years of
college, limited student loan payments to 10 percent of income, and laid out an ambitious agenda to reduce
college costs and promote innovation and competition.
The NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering dates to 1854, when the NYU School of Civil Engineering and
Architecture as well as the Brooklyn Collegiate and Polytechnic Institute (widely known as Brooklyn Poly) were
founded. Their successor institutions merged in January 2014 to create a comprehensive school of education and
research in engineering and applied sciences, rooted in a tradition of invention, innovation and entrepreneurship.
In addition to programs at its main campus in downtown Brooklyn, it is closely connected to engineering
programs in NYU Abu Dhabi and NYU Shanghai, and it operates business incubators in downtown Manhattan
and Brooklyn. For more information, visit http://engineering.nyu.edu.
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